Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Yes, there will be. I am sure it is only a matter of time before they arrive.

I am pleased to bring the Water Services Bill 2014 before the Seanad today. I want to acknowledge that I am bringing this Bill into the House very late in the year. I appreciate that additional time has been allocated by the Seanad to consider the Bill before the House adjourns for the Christmas break. I acknowledge that and thank the Members. I want to express my appreciation to everyone for organising this debate. In other circumstances, I would have preferred to have a less condensed schedule for the consideration of the Bill, but I will shortly outline the rationale for the Government’s efforts to enact the Bill before the end of the year.

There were 40 hours of robust debate on the Bill in the Dáil. During the debate we had an extensive exchange of views from a large number of the Members both on the provisions of the Bill and wider issues surrounding both the water sector reforms and the funding model for Irish Water and various other issues. I will not say we had full agreement on many of the matters but I reflected on the contributions of Deputies and took on board what they said. I also reflected on the thoughts of Senators previously and the way in which we constructed the Bill. I am glad to be back here. To reflect some important issues raised during this debate, I brought forward two amendments on Report Stage which have been incorporated in the Bill passed by Dáil Éireann.

I would like to touch briefly on these two amendments before running through the Bill in its entirety. With regard to section 2, which provides for a plebiscite of the people, should a future Government propose to initiate legislation that would lead to the privatisation of Irish Water, which I do not believe is likely, I fully understand the views expressed by Deputies against the potential privatisation of Irish Water.